Americas

The electoral defeat of Kerry and the Democratic Party underlines, more
than anything else, how right Ralph Nader was to challenge the two-party
system. The Democrats’ failure in the 2004 election proved, once again,
that they are unable and unwilling to offer a serious challenge to Bush
and the Republicans’ right-wing corporate agenda.

However, media pundits and apologists for Kerry are, predictably,
drawing the opposite conclusions. They blame the Democrats’ loss on
ordinary Americans who, they allege, are moving to the right. In this
vein, the post-election commentaries on the Nader campaign have been
sneering obituaries for the movement to break the corporate duopoly on
politics.

Citing Nader’s low vote, reporter Scott Shane concluded: "The returns
seem to repudiate Mr. Nader’s argument that many Americans are looking
for a progressive alternative to the two major parties, which he
describes as ‘indentured to corporate power.’" (New York Times, 11/06/04)

It is true that Nader/Camejo received only 400,000 votes, approximately
0.5%, compared to the 2.8 million votes Nader received in the 2000
election. Still, a superficial glance at these numbers would appear to
support the argument that the potential for building a left political
alternative in the U.S. has been eclipsed.

But actually Nader’s low vote says more about the fundamentally
undemocratic, winner-take-all election system than it does about support
for Nader and his program. An Associated Press poll indicated 33% of
voters might vote for Nader if they thought he had a chance of winning.
This number would undoubtedly be higher if the corporate media hadn’t
shut out Nader’s anti-war, anti-corporate message and allowed more
people to hear it.

On a host of pressing issues, ordinary Americans favor Nader’s
pro-worker stands over the corporate-sponsored policies pushed by Kerry
and Bush. Nader enjoys broad-based public support in his calls for
universal national healthcare, ending the Iraq occupation, a crackdown
on corporate crime, living wage jobs, canceling "free-trade" deals,
rigorous environmental protections, increasing funding and access to
abortion clinics, stopping the racist war on drugs, ending the death
penalty, and much more.

At any rate, Nader’s final vote was never going to be the key measure of
the campaign’s success or its historic significance. Socialist
Alternative explained from the outset that, in the context of the
overwhelming "Anybody but Bush" mood and a close election between Bush
and Kerry, Nader’s vote would be tightly squeezed. It is striking that,
even in the face of the massive anger at Bush and Democrats’ mantra that
Nader cost Gore the 2000 election, polls this summer showed up to 7%
(over 10 million voters) planned to vote for Nader.

Despite his small final vote, the stand taken by Nader and the small
layer of active supporters behind him inspired a ferocious debate on the
left, affecting the political outlook of tens of millions of people.
Building on the success of his 2000 run, Nader’s 2004 candidacy forced a
widespread discussion on the corporate character of the Democratic Party
and the need to build an alternative party that stands up for the
millions against the millionaires, planting seeds for the future
formation of such a party.

The war on Nader

The most striking confirmation of Nader’s broad appeal was given by the
Democratic Party itself and its allied organizations. Tens of millions
of dollars were diverted from the fight to unseat Bush toward an all-out
war on the Nader campaign, illustrating that the Kerry campaign fully
appreciated the potential mass appeal of Nader’s anti-war,
anti-corporate message had it penetrated the mainstream political
dialogue.

Thousands of TV, radio, and print advertisements were purchased to
slander Nader and his supporters. This against a candidate who could not
afford any advertisements of his own! Anti-Nader websites sprang up, and
mass spamming of potential Nader supporters was organized. An atmosphere
of intimidation was consciously created. Ridiculously, Nader was widely
accused of receiving most of his money and support from pro-Bush forces!
Predictably, when the corporate media even mentioned the Nader campaign,
they merely repeated the anti-Nader mantras developed in Kerry campaign
focus groups.

Most scandalous of all, the Kerry campaign hired thousands of lawyers to
keep Nader off the ballot, mounting dozens of frivolous legal challenges
explicitly designed as a "war of attrition" to sap Nader’s limited
resources. Nader estimates up to $20 million was spent on this effort
alone! The Democrats and Republicans also conspired to keep Nader out of
the presidential debates even though 57% of Americans wanted more
candidates included (Zogby poll, 10/22/04).

This effort to disenfranchise Nader voters was an enormous attack on
democratic rights, comparable to the massive Florida voter fraud in
2000. Alongside the pre-existing anti-democratic hurdles to ballot
access, these attacks meant Nader got on the ballot in only 34 states.
Being kept off the ballot in 16 states, including California,
Massachusetts, and Oregon, was a major factor depressing Nader’s vote.

Historic significance

The Democratic Party’s unprecedented assault on the Nader campaign is
itself an invaluable experience which will be studied and analyzed by
future movements for independent progressive political alternatives, as
they develop in the coming period and soberly face up to the challenges
they confront.

Beyond that, however, the small vote for Nader does not mitigate the
important impact the campaign had on the electoral debate and on the
left. Millions of voters considered voting for Nader and wrestled with
the questions his campaign brought up. Discussions over the corporate
character of the Democratic Party, the undemocratic electoral system,
and the need for political representation for ordinary people, among
other issues, would have barely registered in the popular consciousness
had Nader not run.

Regardless of what the small activist base built around Nader does in
the next period, the ideas popularized and the example set by the
campaign will undoubtedly contribute to future attempts to build a
left-wing, working-class party in the future. The 2000 and 2004 Nader
campaigns established that it was possible and necessary to build a
pro-worker, anti-war political alternative.

Major social upheavals and movements are inevitable in the years ahead.
The occupation of Iraq, the deepening economic crisis, and the ferocious
attacks by the right will force workers, oppressed communities, and
young people to organize a fight-back. On this basis, the question of
forming an anti-war, working-class political challenge to the two
parties of big business will arise again and again. Viewed historically,
Nader’s campaign has played a pioneering role.

The debate on the left

In the 2000 election, Nader’s campaign rose on the high tide of the
movement against corporate globalization, and a host of progressive
celebrities jumped onto the bandwagon. In contrast, Nader’s 2004 run
took place amid the demoralization of the anti-war movement after it
failed to stop the Iraq war. Most middle-class progressives drew
pessimistic conclusions from this experience, and turned to Kerry in
their desperate desire to see Bush defeated.

But it is moments like the 2004 election, when taking a principled stand
isn’t so fashionable, that every political tendency shows its true
colors. Nader’s campaign functioned as a sort of litmus test for the
left, sharply distinguishing between those willing to bend under the
popular pressures of the moment and those with sufficient clarity and
perspective to maintain a principled position, keeping their eyes on the
prize.

With few exceptions, the "official" representatives of the U.S. left
fell into line behind Kerry, using their political influence to attack
Nader. Michael Moore, among Nader’s most prominent supporters in 2000,
toured the country in September and October, holding mass rallies to
bolster Kerry’s tepid support among young people and progressives.
Everywhere he went, Moore did the Democrats’ dirty work, mocking Nader
supporters and even spreading the lying smears about Nader’s alleged
alliance with Republicans.

Absurdly, Moore argued that Nader had succeeded in moving the Democrats
to the left and should now retire. Falling into the classic trap of
lesser-evilism, Moore attempted to justify his support for Kerry by
telling fairy tales about Kerry’s progressive credentials and
continually implying he would bring the troops home from Iraq.

Howard Dean and Dennis Kucinich, after being crushed by the Democratic
Party leadership in the primaries, were compelled to expend their
political capital attacking Nader. Sections of their supporters,
outraged that pro-war, Corporate Kerry had won the nomination, argued
that Dean and Kucinich supporters should back Nader. Faced with these
defections, Dean was pushed into a nationally broadcast debate with
Nader. At the Democratic National Convention, Kucinich betrayed his
anti-war supporters by bowing his head, praising Kerry, and avoiding
criticism of the occupation of Iraq.

The Green Party also came under massive pressure to deny Nader their
ballot lines. In what many considered a rigged convention in June, the
Green Party leadership capitulated and endorsed David Cobb who ran a
purely symbolic "safe states" campaign that posed no threat to Kerry.
However, the party is split down the middle on the issue, with half
mobilized around Peter Camejo’s Greens for Nader grouping. This election
provoked the inevitable clash in the Greens between those who see the
party mainly as a pressure group on the Democrats and those fighting for
complete independence from both corporate parties.

Noam Chomsky

Prominent radical intellectuals like Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn, who
have done a lot to popularize radical ideas, unfortunately also urged a
vote for Kerry in swing states (using very left-wing, clever-sounding
justifications for their capitulations).

In an October 21 interview on Democracy Now! Chomsky said: "[The]
election is a marginal affair, it should not distract us from the
serious work of changing the society, and the culture and the
institutions…. You should spend five minutes, maybe, thinking about what
you should do. In that five minutes, you should recognize there is some
difference between the two groups contending for power…. So in that five
minutes that you devote to the topic, you should come to the rational
conclusion, if it’s a swing state, keep the worst guys out."

It takes less than five minutes to see through Chomsky’s attempt to
throw up a left cover to what is, in essence, a position adapted to his
liberal intellectual milieu. Far from being a "marginal affair," the
2004 election was a colossal event. Despite the distorted, confused
character of the electoral debate, tens of millions of Americans were
tuned into politics intensely discussing the issues on a scale
unparalleled in recent times. Moreover, hundreds of millions across the
planet were following the election.

Chomsky’s call to essentially ignore the elections (aside from casting a
tepid vote for Kerry to "keep the worst guys out") amounts to a
contemptuous dismissal of the millions of ordinary people who have
illusions in capitalist democracy and who look to use their vote to
change society. Chomsky correctly explains that we should not allow
social movements to be "distracted" by the elections, but by offering
his blessings to Kerry supporters, he fails to warn against the mother
of all distractions - allegiance to the Democratic Party.

The central justification for the Nader campaign, in fact, was that it
gave voice, within the white heat of the electoral battle, to the
demands of working people and our social movements. It provided a lever
to help pry social movement organizations away from their allegiance
with the Democrats, which only serves to limit their demands, their
tactics, and their expectations to the needs of the party’s big-business
backers.

While the broad social forces that could build a powerful mass party of
working people have yet to be mobilized, when these do develop in the
coming period, the pioneering traditions established around Nader will
help guide their way.